Data Overload
by ACtravels
Summary: Sherlock is crashing off the mistakes made vis a vis the woman (among other things), John isn't so far off hitting Sherlock with something heavy and/or chemically toxic and there's a student murdered at his laptop in Earls Court. Case fic. No romantic pairings, just friendshipy goodness.
1. Chapter 1

This happens between Scandal and Hound (as will become obvious soon, hopefully) and is my first attempt at a casefic for a whiillleee. Also, first Sherlock for quite a bit too (and I'll be returning to writing John in future chapters because I'm more comfortable with him and Sherlock gets pretty tiring). Hopefully you'll enjoy and review and what not :)

Warnings: an excess of italics (as just seems to happen whenever I write from Sherlock's perspective), lots of messy stuff about addictions, murders and the usual things that happen within the Sherlock framework

* * *

His brain was a wash of _one dish half washed the rest still on the side with half a bottle of beer, meaning John was half way through the dishes when his sister called and after that couldn't face either beer or washing anymore, trudged back into the sitting room to nag him to move _(that's cheating, memory not deduction, but the data's already lodged in his brain and it's difficult to forget it.). And _that_, incidentally, is why he snapped at Sherlock because _John wanted to see a familiar face, paused on the threshold of the doorway and tried to talk to Sherlock only no response – _boring conversation, Sherlock didn't – no, Sherlock couldn't _– and so reasoning was sentimental and then Sherlock said tea was dull and life was dull _(classified as _true, _especially as thanks to bloody John Lestrade found out about _that_ and now there are no cases until…) _and John was upset because the reason he hung up on his sister _(phone left in the kitchen, then retrieved as he thought about calling her back, left on the desk, John looked at it repeatedly, ignored second call then switched it off) _was because he didn't want to deal with addiction right at that second and then…_

Well. How was Sherlock supposed to hypothesis when John didn't provide all the evidence? He wasn't an _actual _mind reader and as he hadn't moved off the couch for seven point six hours prior to John storming out to sleep with whatever irritating _girlfriend_ was currently bogging down his mind with pointless crap, so he hadn't _seen the tea bag already in the tea pot John had already been making both of them cups of tea, was waiting for the kettle to boil, just wanted to make conversation. Didn't take kindly to Sherlock's comments. Didn't need it. _

And this was all John's fault, anyway. Because _it was just one needle. _It wasn't like John was idiotic enough to believe that he was as entirely and always completely clean as he made out to be – Lestrade's idiotic drug raids and his inability _not _to let it get under his skin when people were _t_ouching his things which was made mildly worse by the fact that he _really _didn't want to serve time for possession (as Mycroft tended to be less lenient about those sorts of things) – and, morally it was questionable to object to his being less _careful_ in his _habits. _And he'd classified John as having a strong moral framework within the first few seconds, and confirmed it by the end of the first day they'd known each other. Admittedly, conformation of a man being morally sound coming in the form of a gunshot _was _unusual but those sorts of things were what made John interesting.

If John were here, anyway, which he wasn't. Because he was with Sarah or Jeanette or April or whoever it was this time (more forthcoming than Sarah, who's instance on _lilo or sofa _had at least provided some material to deduce other than _that_ sort of information: which, actually, had caused John to quote _Sebastian _at him – 'we'd come down to the formal hall and this _freak _would know you'd been shagging the night before') and was therefore _ not here _and Sherlock was so bored that he wasn't sure _what_ he would do and _nothing was working _and _why was nothing happening anyway?_

His texts to Lestrade were unanswered (mostly consisting of the word 'case' and little else bit his initials) and from his position on the sofa he'd deduced the sexual orientation of every person who'd walked past the window, and not a single bloody person had got mugged. No cases from the website. Even though John couldn't exactly post _Sherlock isn't clean right now, please don't call at Baker Street _on his insufferable blog, they still seemed to have dried up. Or else John had been smarter than usual and redirected the sound of the bell to only sound in Mrs Hudson's flat, and then had Mrs Hudson _intercept _all clients and feed the line about a holiday or health reasons or _something _smart and clever and a little bit _interesting. _

But no, that had not happened, because Sherlock had spent all of Thursday calling take outs and delivery people and taxis to internally the record the difference in pressure and length each stupidly unimportant person had rang the bell for. And _that_ had pissed John off too, because he'd given them John's number and he was out doing _something _and Mrs Hudson was visiting her sister and _Sherlock _certainly wasn't going to answer the doorbell. John hadn't, it seemed, appreciated the many irritated phone calls but he'd _come home_ and that had at least been better because there'd been more data and there'd been something to deduce and an angry John was much superior than no John at all and _it had only been one needle, for goodness sake. _

And he had _regretted_ telling John that he could have cracked the Vaisey Murder case before the second murder meaning John's own personal prejudice against addictions had led to the murder of three innocent women the second John's eyes hardened. He _knew _it had been a-bit-not-good but he couldn't retract the comment and then John was leaving and _there was just nothing to do._

It had been too far. The sort of comment that John talked to him about in the name of ease of living and respecting victims and people. But he _couldn't' stand this. _His brain was rotting and there was no case and no nothing and _withdrawal _and he hated being _clean_ and _sober _and where the hell where the nicotine patches?

Nicotine was a normal persons excuse for an addiction but it was something and usually John didn't get too upset about _smoking _or _patches_ (although Sherlock supposed it would have made a difference as to what Sherlock was smoking, but couldn't' comprehend why _anyone _would subject themselves to weed). And alcohol was a mind numbing _shit _addiction which had put John in a bad mood before Sherlock had even done anything. But he'd take _anything _at this point because –

Doorbell.

_John _had told Sherlock for a man who complained about being bored quite so much, his rant about doorbells had most certainly been _bloody dull _and so Sherlock had been announcing who was at the door before John could look out the window to _prove _that it was valuable and _interesting. _Or at least, as interesting as life was capable of being without cases of drugs or some form of high. And _John _had still been a bit irritated about having to pay off the Chinese take away man and the dominos man and the taxi driver for wasting his time (not that he hadn't been reimbursed – Sherlock had just pointed vaguely at his card and said 'bored' and that had been the end of that), but he'd smiled a bit after the third correct deduction so he'd taken that as forgiveness.

"Lestrade," Sherlock said out loud, almost on automatic and then pulled his dressing gown around him and pulled his legs to his chest (but that one's easy, because Lestrade always rings the same way; two sharp punches of the doorbell which even _Anderson _couldn't miss). _Not _opening door _won't. _Can't.

Only ringing the doorbell due to the fact that Lestrade is always super polite after enforced separation from police work and successful drug raid, normally just walks right in. Mrs Hudson returned to London late last night. Probably asleep (and John, before slamming the door and storming out, had told him not to do anything loud and obnoxious and wake her), but she never sleeps through the doorbell _anyway _and Sherlock is entirely sure that answering the doorbell _would _kill him or destroy some lines of his thought process just by being so _bloody dull. _

Probably take less than ten minutes for her to get up and dressed enough to answer the door. Or Lestrade will give up on politeness and walk in and either way he doesn't have to move, because it's only right here on the sofa when he can actually stand to be alive with his limbs folded _just so _and if he moves out of this position (two point four hours, the length of time from when he'd flounced about angrily after John had left, gone into the kitchen, deduced _everything, _and thrown the beer away with malice and collapsed back on the sofa) then he won't be able to stand a_nything _at all and withdrawal and reality and everything will just be _too much and – _

"Sherlock."

Correct deduction. Lestrade let himself in, then. Or –

Sherlock turned around but _no _wishful thinking because John wasn't with him _didn't let Lestrade in _so Lestrade had just… just done the unexpected and let himself in almost immediately and… and -

"Got a case for you."

"I _thought," _Sherlock spat, "I was _off _cases."

"Are you _off_ the cocaine?"

Sherlock turned around in effort to find that position again. Facing the back of the sofa with his legs pulled in tight when there wasn't so much _data _to contend with and he could _think _without feeling his mind gearing up into overdrive, or tearing itself to pieces, or racing and racing. Because there was just the sofa and holding his limbs still.

"I've got John in the car," Lestrade continued. _There. Didn't miss anything. Obviously. _"He says you're clean."

Of course he's _clean_ with John's nagging and being off cases and there wasn't really anyway he could _not _be clean. John's a doctor, not as stupid as Sherlock sometimes thinks (at least, not in _medicinal _terms – he'd certainly notice if Sherlock was high if he was looking for it). The whole thing is stupid because it was _one needle _and there's loads of them in the flat but John doesn't know about that and he won't, now, because he'd be banned from cases for months and –

Turned around.

Lestrade was tired. Guilty too, which meant John's told him what Sherlock said about the Vaisey serial killer but there's not much Sherlock can about that now. If they were as bothered about saving lives as they say they were they wouldn't have left him out of the loop for something so _important. _And Sherlock was too despondent even to _look _at the case until after it was solved (the idea of not having access to all the crucial piece of the puzzle sounded like too much on top of everything else) and so it's just theory that he could have solved the murder, but it certainly got their attention so it's all irrelevant, really, and if John hadn't been so _mad _then he wouldn't have minded at all.

"No." Sherlock said, and that position is gone now so there's no point trying to find it and its _data overload all the damn time _and no one seems to understand that they can't just…Can't just take away the drugs and the cases and _everything interesting _all at once.

"Student dead in Earls Court. Blow to the back of the head whilst he was on Facebook."

"No."

It sounds like it has _potential _but that's likely just the boredom making anything interesting and he can't let Lestrade have c_ontrol _because Sherlock has always been in control of his addictions and now he's off cases and there's nothing he can do and it's driving him crazy. And _he just can't stand it can't take can't do it._

"His flatmate says his memory stick's missing. Very insistent about it."

_Memory stick? Student. Unlikely to have any information anyone would be willing to kill for. Accidental? Killer took memory stick to make it look like a break in? No, illogical, wouldn't have taken his laptop. Sobriety effecting thought process. Plagiarism possible, still doubtful. _

"Said he never took it out of his laptop. Will you come?"

"Later."

"John says to tell you you have to ride in the police car."

John's bloody overprotectiveness won't leave him alone until he disappears leaves him to deal with the boredom and then…

"I _need _a cigarette."

Lestrade surprised. Sherlock hasn't smoked for a significant period of time but he can't _think _for ease of breathing and he's so _sober_ that his thoughts hurt and if he doesn't have something then he's going to… going to –

"We'll wait."

Sherlock scowled, threw himself off the sofa and into his room. Remerged ten minutes later in actual clothing, a packet of cigarettes and the same sour expression.

"Fine." He said, pulling on his coat and thinking that he might not be ready for a case, might want to stay inside in that position and look at the sofa because all the data _hurts_ and he really needs to be high for this and he's not and there's so much information and _oh look, Mrs Hudson has her idiot nephew to stay and John's in the car and not looking happy about Sherlock lighting up a cigarette but at least it's not in the flat. _

The first breath of nicotine makes him fell slightly better. Not because a single cigarette has anywhere near enough effect for him to be able to _think _properly, but because it's a promise that there will be relief _soon. _

And after the nicotine, there'd be the case.


	2. Chapter 2

John generally thought that he'd gotten used to the many shades and hues of Sherlock fairly quickly: he could deal with the erratic bursts of violin and pacing interspersed with complete stillness, and the lack of eating and no sleeping, and pre-case Sherlock and post-case Sherlock and no-case Sherlock and all the other Sherlocks he'd dealt with since the insufferable man had become his flatmate (or the other way round, really, but that was moot point). And given he'd now spent over a year in residing in Baker Street he had thought that he'd seen it all, but then he'd never seen Sherlock deal with an actual failure before: sure, he'd been reported baffled about that business with the man in the boot of the car (although that had ended up related) and he'd been _too late _to save someone too – both of which resulted in him being irritable and silent and more of a pain in the arse than normal – but this time Sherlock had put all the pieces together and got the answer _wrong _because of his own sense of arrogance.

John hadn't even got the full story, really. Sherlock had turned up again in the middle of the night, white as anything, hadn't moved off the sofa for several hours before finally looking at the stack of cold cases Lestrade had given him for next time he was complaining of 'boredom' and in the next twenty four hours Sherlock had found enough information out of the 'poorly made inadequate' notes to locate two missing persons – one, unfortunately, buried in the parent's back garden – and solve two further murder enquiries without leaving the flat. He hadn't been able to find room within himself to be impressed, because the whole thing was frankly so alarming that it was all John could do not to confiscate the remaining files and sedate Sherlock with something.

He'd gotten the details off Mycroft.

Course, after his supply of cold cases ran out and Lestrade was buried too deep in the subsequent paper to get involved on that big murder and the other Detective Inspector – Gregerson – had been such a tosser that John had almost added assaulting a police officer to his resume, and in the end Sherlock had emailed the relevant details and fallen into a state of _nothingness _for at least a week.

And John had hated it.

Sherlock had barely spoken but to state that he was _absolutely fine, John_ and then had taken to disappearing at odd times of the night and his expression melted into that _vulnerability _which was such a damn lie. The one John purely associated with some chemical high or other, or acting for short periods of time on a case – he didn't like it in either case. And when Sherlock disappeared for a long enough period of time that John had nearly filed out a missing persons file, John wasn't deluding himself into believing Sherlock's derisive 'case' in answer to his questions.

Course, the needle had been the last straw.

He wasn't ignorant, but the fact that Sherlock was either too far gone to bother hiding it any more, or was incapable of doing so was a blatant cry for help that he couldn't ignore. And the flat hadn't exactly been a nice place to be since then.

"John," Lestrade said, approaching with his own take out coffee cup and an almost grim expression, "how is everything?"

The last time John had seen Lestrade it had been to demand for Greg to catalogue the whole history of Sherlock's drug abuse, to his knowledge, so he could log every overdose, every substance Sherlock had been hooked on and all the other little details in between. _What had changed? Why had he stopped before? _To be fair to him, Greg had done his best, but hinted that the six years he'd known the man had definitely not been the worse before asking _is Sherlock okay?_

To which, obviously, John had to answer with a resounding no.

So Sherlock was off cases and even worse than ever, and John quit another job to act as a vigil to withdrawal-Sherlock, who was the biggest tosser yet. He tried to keep him at least semi-occupied with deducing the lie detectors on Jeremy Kyle or whatever it was. Endless google searches about drug addictions, more than a few trips to the library and phone calls to his other medical-mates later, and Sherlock was looking a little better. He'd put back on some of the weight. More liable to throw insults around again. But moody as ever stuck in the flat with John acting as a prison warden (more or less), and John was acutely aware that his brain was melting out of sheer boredom and that he was sure to get the classic '_but you don't think_!' rant soon enough.

"Better," John said, shrugging his shoulders slightly and wondering how having his flatmate blame him for the murder of three women was an _improvement _but he was almost sure that Sherlock hadn't looked at the case until the past week, when he seemed to be a person rather than an occasionally animate corpse. "He's been clean for a few weeks."

"How clean?"

"Squeaky," John said, wondering how much of that he could actually believe. The withdrawal had certainly been very real, there was no denying that, but given he'd near-convinced himself that Sherlock wasn't that far off an overdose (probably him over thinking as with Harry and her alcohol was the main basis of his assumptions and they were a bit different) he'd expected Sherlock to still be… well, _not _exactly cold turkey. But right now he was _sure _the man was as sober as Sherlock ever was. "Got any cases?"

"One or two."

"Could you let him in?"

"Yeah," Lestrade said, after a sip of his coffee, "can't imagine he's much fun to live with at the moment."

"He said he could have solved the Vaisey murder after the first victim." John said, pressing his fingers to his temples for a second. In the beginning, John had decided that he only be pushed so far. The first time Sherlock brought him across London to text a bloody murderer, John decided there were certain lines that he would not cross.

Then, course, he killed for him and tried to save his life through sacrificing himself to a mad criminal mastermind with a fondness for Westwood, which meant at some point he'd probably crossed that line and then some. But, it had stopped being about living with Sherlock because he was interesting and he liked co-inhabiting a flat with a mad genius, to Sherlock being his best friend and the primary functional relationship in his life. And he could deal with self-destruction, too, but he had to redraw the line somewhere.

"I've got to ask," Gregory Lestrade said, looking a little more grey than John had last seen him, actually, "what happened? Been checking the blog, but…"

This was the point that always plagued John and followed him around, because it was a somewhat unspoken agreement of anonymity between Sherlock and John. Partially it was just common sense, because although he classified Greg as one of his good friends he wasn't really sure what the Detective Inspector side of the man would say about illegal fire arms (although, realistically, he must have noticed what with the holes in the walls), or the fact that they had, on several occasions, broken into apartments and what not. Then, more than that, was the unspoken agreement of friendship that was Sherlock-and-John… and he wasn't entirely sure whether Sherlock would want to know about the latest weakness John had upturned.

"National secrets," John said. Lestrade raised his eyebrows and didn't look entirely as surprised as the conversation would usually require within every day conversation and set down his cup of coffee.

"Just, what are we dealing with here?"

"A failure," John said, shaking his head slightly, "large scale."

"Seriously?"

"A woman."

"Jesus." Lestrade said, taking up his coffee again and shaking his head with what John considered due surprise and exasperation. Predating Christmas, he wouldn't exactly have associated Sherlock Holmes with woman troubles (any further than getting Mrs Hudson to either do the cleaning or not do the cleaning, depending on his mood), and yet this whole debacle had been kick started by a _woman. _

"Irene Adler?" Lestrade said, "saw that on you blog."

"Don't google it," John advised, "look, Greg, I need to get back – I mean, Sherlock… but if you've got a case?"

"Yeah," Lestrade said, pulling out his phone, "we'll stop by Baker Street on the way, if you think he's fit."

"Leave it any longer the flat certainly won't be," John said, drowning the dregs of his coffee and feeling the beginning of what was likely a very long day creeping up on him, "mind if I stay in the car? Dunno if I can resist hitting him in the face after this morning."

"Course," Lestrade said, crushing the coffee cup in his right hand.

"But…" John said, as they exited the shop onto the pavement, "ring the doorbell before you go in… he..." John was half tempted to say, in that usual exasperated tone, that Sherlock – the mad bastard – could now deduce who was at the door with ease, but suddenly felt it too personal, "probably hasn't got dressed," John finished. "Give him some warning."

~~0o0o0~~

John hadn't seen Sherlock smoke since before Christmas: after Mycroft, John and Mrs Hudson combined had 'overacted' so 'ridiculously' with the businesses about the cigarette on Christmas day in their three-way fight against danger-nights, Sherlock had made a point to ignore the things like they might actually cause him harm, or something.

The post failure downfall had gone straight from sobriety to cocaine, as far as John could work out (not that his questions had gotten any answer other than for Sherlock too attack his choice of jumper).

"Thought he'd given up." Lestrade said, climbing back into the front of the car and watching Sherlock smoke through one, two, three cigarettes before making to move towards them.

"Forgotten you owned real clothes," John commented when Sherlock eventually climbed into car. Purple shirt, coat and scarf reinstated and most welcome, because Sherlock's pyjamas were up there with some of his worst jumpers.

"Really, John," Sherlock said, turning his gaze on him, "hardly much point getting changed if I'm under house arrest."

"I said you could go to the shop."

"With an escort."

"Some people call it company."

"Shut up."

"Done bickering back there?" Lestrade asked pointedly from the front. "Want filling in, Sherlock?"

"I doubt it," Sherlock said, gaze turning to the window, "most likely anything you say will be clouded by so much ignorance that by the time you've stopped talking I'll know less than I did before hand."

"That's Sherlock for car journeys are supposed to be silent." John said, returning to his own window and trying to remember the few times he'd actually managed to have a conversation with the man _whilst _in a taxi (which is where they seemed to spend most of their time). Recently, he'd taken to climbing in and shutting the door before John had a chance to hear where they were supposed to be headed, but for the large part he got a string of deductions and case related talk if they were in the middle of something or going somewhere he thought might lead to something relatively interesting (which, when with Sherlock, was usually a bit alarming). _Not_ before the case had really started though.

"Earls court." Lestrade said.

"You mentioned it."

"Kid's Vincent Harper, goes by Vince."

"Irrelevant."

"Sherlock," John muttered, looking back from the window to glare at him to find him still starting resolutely out the window. Tosser. "You can hardly solve a case without knowing the victim's name."

"Although it might be a_ nice little_ extraneous detail to add to your blog," Sherlock said, turning back to the middle to meet John's gaze, "it hardly bares any real importance to the matter at hand."

"Right," John said, "I'll remind you of that when you ask for more data later."

"Pointless asking_ you_ anyway." Sherlock said, still facing him. Sherlock still had that odd vulnerability that had been floating round him since the return to the drugs, and John couldn't help but notice that the man was shaking ever so slightly and started debating whether or not this was a good idea. The vague awareness of the apparent transparency of his thoughts (something he'd been reminded of all too often as of late) force him to push that back of his mind and just carry on the sort of staring contest that was continuing at the back of the police car.

Why _did_ Sherlock usually avoid police cars like the plague?

He was still mad at his idiotic flatmate, course, but he also loved the mad tosser enough to sit on the anger and save it for when Sherlock could answer properly; a withdrawal-Sherlock with nothing to do and no cases and no freedom was surely not quite as responsible for what he said as John would like to hold him, and given a lot of the past two weeks had been his doing – for Sherlock's own good – he should have expected the back lash.

He'd had his breathing space in the form of Gregory Lestrade and a cup of coffee, and now it was time to go back to thinking solely about whether Sherlock was okay, really, wondering where the hell Mycroft was in all this and why Sherlock had started smoking again.

"Here." Lestrade said, pulling up.

Sherlock was pulling the cigarettes out his coat all ready, fumbling in a way that John might have called clumsy if it hadn't been _Sherlock _with his lighter.

"We'll be up in a minute," John said, squaring his shoulders at the cold of London in late February and stepping out the car. "Chaining it a bit today, aren't you?"

"Very little point in giving into your nagging about smoking inside to have you stand next to me." Sherlock said, inhaling.

"Is not smoking in the flat an apology?"

"No."

"Apology accepted, then," John said, glancing up at the row of houses in which Vince had apparently lived and died then. "Back on cases… how are we feeling about that, then?"

"You're the one with the therapist, not me."

"Never did understand that." John agreed, shoving his hands into his pockets and glancing at the street. He wasn't sure what could be said for Sherlock, but he'd really missed being on a case. Everything had been so hectic lately he'd barely had a chance to update his blog, and that fact alone seemed to have stopped new client s turning up on the door… as if they believed they might still be in the middle of something. Which they were, course, but he did hope the whole country wasn't aware that Sherlock was crashing off cocaine after screwing up a case centred around a dominatrix.

"I can go in now if you want."

"No," Sherlock said, perhaps a little too quickly, "it's… fine."

John nodded. He wouldn't fancy facing Anderson and Lestrade alone either. And it wasn't like he couldn't have predicted Sherlock's answer, but if the odd acknowledgement that something was_ fine_ were the only scraps of affection John could get from his best mate then John wasn't beyond digging for them, particularly after the frankly abysmal state of the day so far.


	3. Chapter 3

"Student accommodation doesn't seem to have gotten any better." John said as he stepped over the threshold of the crime scene and into Vincent Harper's Earls Court flat with a grim expression.

"Excessive washing, empty bottles and a corpse." Sherlock said, the only sign that he wasn't quite as _fine _as normal was a hand which normally reeked of eloquence hovering, almost self consciously, at the base of his scarf. John took the fact that he hadn't immediately been told that his small talk was irrelevant and distracting as a sign that Sherlock was falling back on their easy banter as a way to assure himself that he was _okay. _

"Ah," John said, "no corpses. I didn't live with you whilst at uni."

"There are no corpses in Baker Street." Sherlock said, stepping further into the flat.

"Only bits."

"Nothing bigger than a foot." Sherlock said, glancing back in John's direction with what might have been a smile, had Anderson and Donovan not been inhabiting the fringes of the room.

"You delete most of my rules." John muttered.

"This is a crime scene." Anderson said pointedly. John had to admit that he'd once been a lot less inclined to engage in casual conversation whilst there was a dead body in the room, but spending such a length of time with Sherlock had desensitised him to the ethical implications of crime scenes. Still, he was usually a lot more vigilant about_ not _giggling or joking or bickering about the milk – particularly with Anderson and or Donovan present, as Sherlock tended to prefer for them to see him as a machine rather than a real person with a life – but at the moment his priority was firmly with whatever was good for Sherlock's wellbeing, and as Sherlock had not only neglected to tell him to shut up but had also perpetuated the conversation, John didn't really give a shit about contaminating Anderson's crime scene with their usual domestic conversations.

"Congratulations, Anderson," Sherlock said, gaze still fixated on the dead body and the laptop, "your ability to state the obvious remains on top form. I had noticed the dead student, yes. Now, take three steps backwards, stop thinking and close the door."

"Outside the flat?"

"Yes, outside," Sherlock muttered irritably.

"Anderson," Lestrade said, nodding towards the door and watching Sherlock carefully. "Fifteen minutes."

John didn't watch Anderson leave and Anderson didn't argue; everyone was a little too used to the routine to put up much of a fight.

"Five," Sherlock corrected, setting his glare on Lestrade for a split second, "I am _fine, _Lestrade, and it would be much easier to do my job if you -"

"Sherlock," John interjected, "there's two glasses on the table, so he was with someone?"

"Obviously," Sherlock said, stepping forward "I very much doubt he would have been able to incur a fatal blow to the back of his head on his own."

Honestly, John could have worked that out. They both knew full well that his speaking was merely an intervention to stop Sherlock going off on a rant about how they needed to stop babying him when he was perfectly capable of coping with cocaine addictions, withdrawal and coming up with fitting insults for Anderson without either of them stepping in and trying to do what was _best _for his welfare. For one, John was fed up of hearing it. Sherlock was a good actor, but only for short bursts at a time (longer when illicit substances were fuelling the acting), and John lived with him and therefore believed he had enough authority to categorically say that _Sherlock was not okay._

The main reason for shutting him up was because Donovan was watching the whole thing a little bit too closely and probably wasn't as ignorant as John would have liked about the whole thing: _she _knew that Sherlock was an ex-addict, and she knew that he'd been off cases for awhile, and she might even be perceptive enough to notice that Sherlock was not his usual arsehole self. He didn't want Donovan prattling on about whether John was regretting his decision to live with (and follow around) Sherlock now that his best mate was back on drugs.

"His flatmate?" John suggested.

"No," Sherlock said, stepping forwards and beginning the usual routine prodding, sniffing and otherwise breaking the usual rules of personal boundaries when it came to dead bodies, "Vincent Harper was a heavy drinker."

"Sorry?" John prompted.

"The washing up that you brought out attention to when we entered the room." John glanced over at the collection of dirty dishes and tried to come up with something meaningful from the mismatched assortment of IKEA plates and slightly crusty saucepans. His thoughts had just reached a blocking point when it came to the fact that whoever had the pasta with the cream sauce should really have washed up straight away, because it was going to be a bugger to clean now, when Sherlock sighed irritably and began his usual routine of flouncing about the room looking intelligent and a little bit mad. "The washing up rota stuck to the fridge," Sherlock said, rolling his eyes at the pair of them, "Vincent was found dead on Friday morning. It was _his _turn to do the washing on Thursday night. _Rachit_ ticked off his washing up day on the Wednesday night, therefore this is one day's worth of washing. With that, you can see that the washing has been left in piles of _meals – _the bowls for breakfast, pasta for lunch... and, because Vincent was obviously lazy, leaving his washing up until late at night, he's just transferred everything left over from his meals to the space next to the sink. It's very unlikely that anyone _other _than a drinker would have had two beers for breakfast."

"They could be the flatmates? Rachit's?"

"Rachit does not drink," Sherlock said, distractedly. "As you mentioned, two glasses – both of which contained an alcoholic drink. Gin and tonic, I expect. Besides, I presume Rachit had an alibi?"

"He was with his course mate," Lestrade said.

"What day of the week is the glass recycling collected on this street?" Sherlock asked.

"I don't -"

"– never mind," Sherlock interrupted, pulling out his phone, "text me if forensics turns anything up. Although that is, of course, doubtful."

"Shouldn't you question Rachit?" Lestrade asked, glancing at John for a split second. "He was insistent about this missing memory stick –"

"– please don't try to give me advice, Detective Inspector, it's embarrassing for everyone involved. I'll text you. John," Sherlock said, turning around in a flurry of coat to face him, "dinner?"

"Starving." John agreed to the empty space where Sherlock used to be. Sherlock had already thrown open the front door to the flat (and, if the swearwords were anything to go buy, the door had hit Anderson in the face in the process) and was already making his way down the stairs. "Er," John said, "Later, Greg."

"Bye, John," Lestrade said, lifting up at hand by way of greeting before calling Anderson back into the room.

John wasn't entirely sure what to make of the whole thing. Whilst Sherlock hadn't acted too far out of the range of the norm, there was something a little too tense about the line of his shoulders and his sudden reversion to chain smoking definitely wasn't a good sign. He'd spend too long talking before deducing anything, too. Hadn't said anything much about the actual death, really.

It'd be a relief to listen to Sherlock's rant about washing up. The last rant he'd heard was about the doorbell, and although it was as brilliant as the rants always were, its inherent uselessness had made John feel on edge. He wasn't entirely sure how knowing who was at the door could possibly be helpful to any real cases, and seemed the sort of thing Sherlock would quickly deem unnecessary and then delete; that smacked of those moments when Sherlock's brain was at a danger of racing out of control and into the realms of the alarming, deducing anything and everything to the death just for something to do. The bit about the washing up, though, that had a purpose – it proved the man drank a lot and confirmed another's alibi. Brilliant. John hadn't said, either.

He was just making a mental note to bring it up later (in the most inartificial way he could manage, although Sherlock would probably see through him) as John hadn't been very nice towards his flatmate lately, and as he was the only one remotely complimentary he suspected no one else had either. A lot of things could be sorted out with a cup of tea and being told you were brilliant.

"Sherlock," John said, stopping just short of walking straight into him and sucking in a comment about _yet another _cigarette. "Where are we going?"

"Angelo's," Sherlock said, dropping the cigarette on the floor – half smoked – and stubbing it out underneath one of his ridiculously expensive shoes.

~0o0o0o0~

It was unusual for Sherlock to specifically think of _food _in the middle of a case.

Mostly, John's stomach would rumble loud enough for it to annoy Sherlock into pausing at a cafe or a restaurant, or else – like with the study in pink – the restaurant would just be in a mildly convenient place. Even when food was remembered, it was purely for John's sake and he was often given five or ten minutes to chew as much as he could before being expected to break into someone's house or something equally absurd.

And then, after being off cocaine for a little under a month, and finally back on cases Sherlock suggested 'Angelo's ' and ordered himself a mushroom fettuccine.

John's reaction of blinking at his tosser of a flatmate for a few long seconds had been cut short by Sherlock rolling his eyes deliberately and making an indefinable noise of displeasure. He was half tempted to shoot back _I don't eat on cases _and _digestion slows me down_ but thought better off it.

John cleared his throat.

"That thing about the washing up rota," John said, as Angelo arrived in record time with both meals (probably due to the shock of Sherlock actually ordering himself something, no doubt), "that was really, really..."

"It's not an adequate substitute," Sherlock said, half smiling at him.

"What isn't?"

"Compliments."

"For?"

"Cocaine," Sherlock said, picking up his fork and actually _eating. _

"Well," John said, starting his own meal as the shock of watching Sherlock eat _without _incessant nagging as foreplay for the meal began to wear off slightly, "not smoking in the flat isn't really an adequate substitute for an apology, but I'm dealing with it."

Sherlock _did _smile that time. John felt that same sense of contentment that he always associated with getting something _right _when it came to Sherlock and relishing in these moments when they were just two friends – equals – sharing dinner. He liked the cases and all the different shades of Sherlock, but he liked it best when Sherlock actually seemed _content _and the beginning of a new case and the reversion to a nicotine addiction seemed to be, at this very moment, enough for that to happen.

"How's your lasagne?"

"Good." John nodded, taking another forkful.

"You're easily pleased," Sherlock said, shaking his head slightly, "it's one of the poorest dishes on the menu, but then lasagne has never been to my taste. Angelo's chef is allergic to tomatoes, so you'd be better opting for the non tomato based dishes."

"Where's your brother, Sherlock?" John asked, glancing up and waiting for the inevitable reaction. Sherlock's expression soured slightly.

"Busy," Sherlock said, "your attempts to contact him have been futile, I assume?"

"Not answering his phone."

"Hmm," Sherlock said, his gaze sweeping the restaurant, "the couple next to us read your blog."

"Really?"

"Either that, or their absurdly interested in the state of your lasagne."

"How on earth do you know that?" John asked, leaning forwards slightly as to hear Sherlock's stream of deductions without being overheard by the two girls on the table next door (who were, according to Sherlock, a couple).

"Because they're _staring," _Sherlock said with an eye roll, grinning at John's expression. "Nothing all that elaborates in that deduction. If you were listening over the sound of your own _mundane _thoughts about my brother you'd have heard them whisper about _the Speckled Blonde _and my suspicious hiatus."

"Oh."

"Although, if you're interested in something clever then the blonde one spent the morning trying to avoid the advances of her middle aged optician."

"Sherlock," John said, glancing up at him over his dinner "are you okay?"

"They're debating whether we're a couple and if that's the reason the blog hasn't been updated." Sherlock said, standing up suddenly and pulling out a packet of cigarettes from his pocket, wrapping his scarf around his neck and striding towards the door.

"Have you ever observed the message on the side of a cigarette packet," John asked pointedly, "_Smoking kills."_

"So do serial killers," Sherlock muttered before the door swung shut behind him.

John sighed as he procured another forkful of lasagne. He'd spent the past month on a state of red alert, waiting for the next Sherlock related disaster. Things finally seemed to be looking up, and yet – if he distanced himself – watching the back of his flatmate chain smoking to an absurd degree, shoulders hunched, not properly focused on the case at hand, and refusing to talk about_ any of it_ (not that John had expected differently), it didn't really feel like this should be the _improvement._

John had a feeling that Vincent Harper and his heavy drinking would have to wait until Sherlock was functioning a little better.

Then he realised he'd spent a good few minutes staring at Sherlock's back and that the couple on the table next door were still watching and he wasn't doing the whole 'not gay' thing any favours.

Another day in the life then, really.

* * *

_**Right, I think I am definitely back in the swing of this which is nice. I think poor John probably needs a holiday, but I don't think he's going to be getting one any time soon. Thanks for reading!**_


	4. Chapter 4

The most irritating part about missing the two most important people in his life falling off the bandwagon was that he'd been forewarned.

At Christmas John had said that Harry was doing well, and Sherlock had quite clearly told him that he was wrong. John hadn't really wanted to think about it and had instead opted for ignoring the fact that Sherlock had laid out the facts for him.

After that he'd been so caught up in Sherlock and the business with Irene Adler that Harry's decline had washed completely over his head, until he began to notice the size of Sherlock's pupils and the constant, ever present thoughts about a_ddiction _were pushing in on his mind until he was seeing them everywhere.

He hadn't known how to broach the subject with Sherlock at first and, anyway, he was sure that there'd been one or two single _incidents _of relapse whilst he'd been in the flat, and maybe Sherlock would manage to pull himself out of this whilst they both pretended that John was ignorant. He'd convinced himself that everything was going to be fine for a little while but he wasn't sure to the extent of that he'd ever believed, but accepting that Sherlock was using again was accepting everything that meant.

John Watson wasn't about to let a junkie onto a crime scene if he knew about it, even if the former mentioned junkie was his flatmate and best friend. Other half, really.

Then Sherlock had said that Harry had stopped going to AA meetings and that addiction had hit him full in the face too, and then he _had _busted both of them for it, had _both _of them hating him for the withdrawal, then when he _finally _had Sherlock almost fit for work Harry had gotten herself in a bloody drunk driving accident in the middle of the flaming school run.

She wasn't seriously hurt, but her leg was still in plaster and she kept nagging him to visit.

Whilst Sherlock wasn't really known for being the most sympathetic of beings (self diagnosed high functioning sociopath and all), he usually made an effort when something like this happened. After he found out about the break up with Sarah he'd gone out and brought him beer – a meaningless gesture in real terms, but from Sherlock that was flowers and a necklace – and then whenever there was news about fatalities in Afghanistan, Sherlock dragged him out to his favourite restaurant for a meal. He did small, practical things that meant more than any grand gesture of sympathy or commiserations ever could, which was why he wanted Sherlock to deduced it all out of him so he didn't have to say, so he'd have said something _nice _instead of telling him that his prejudice against addictions had led to people _dying. _

He needed a case to distract himself.

There was a possibility that he wasn't entirely honest when he'd told Lestrade that Sherlock was ready for a case, because the mid-case-meal and the very little Sherlock had managed to do was setting off all the alarms bells in his head; he wasn't _ready _and here John was dragging him through it simply because he didn't want to talk about his sister, or alcohol, or deal with any of it.

When he stepped in the kitchen to make himself a compulsory cup of tea John noted that his half empty beer had been thrown away.

John Watson crossed the kitchen and glanced in the recycling. Sherlock hadn't bothered emptying the bottle before throwing it in the green box with the rest of the jars and bottles but, by the look of the crack running down its length, he'd definitely thrown the bottle with considerable force. He'd take not smoking in the flat as an apology and an almost smashed bottle of beer as a sign of regret, and whilst that wasn't the hug he'd been dying for since that last phone call to Harry it would most definitely do.

~0o0o0o0~

Sherlock was too quiet.

John was just considering blogging about how living with Sherlock was like being responsible of a particularly intelligent toddler. Recently, a couple of his old school friends had starting having children and, on the rare occasion he managed to make time between murders, the visits and his parents describing _parenthood _reminded him a lot of his own situation; the perpetual worry, the constant questioning of whether certain behaviour was okay or something to really worry about, disrupted sleeping patterns, trying to provide food and trying to ensure it was eaten... the more his tired old best friend prattled on about his two year old the more John was thinking _I know how that feels._

He opted against suggesting there were similarities between a cocaine addict and their pride and joy, but didn't think it would make a bad blog entry. Then he started thinking about examples he could use and got slightly fixated on the fact that, usually, case-Sherlock was one that prattled on about things and generally seemed to be doing something _productive _with his time or, otherwise, at least insulted him and told him to shut up every few minutes.

And there was nothing.

As far as John was aware there'd been zero progress on the Vincent case (and, from his point of view, there was zero progress on thinking of a witty blog title either) and the photo's of his smashed in head or Vincent's apartment had not yet graced the walls. Sherlock had simply spent an uncharacteristic length of time in his room; his usual disregard for respect of property did not stretch to his bedroom, which was a near-sacred land, barely used as a sleeping space, barely occupied and most definitely _not _to be disrupted by the experiments and test tubes and the clutter that ran rampant everywhere else.

Sherlock rarely even slept in his room, instead opting for passing out on the sofa or –on that memorable occasion – John's room. So for him to have spent the whole morning in his room and –

He hadn't even a _cigarette. _

_Unless _Sherlock wasn't in and then... well then he could be anywhere and that was definitely _not good _and... why the hell hadn't John thought about this earlier? He'd been sat thinking about his _stupid _blog when Sherlock could be dead in his room or shooting up in some alley or just... well, with Sherlock there wasn't exactly an _end _to the possibilities of what horrible things could have happened or be happening.

"Sherlock?" John called, trying to stop his voice from relaying the fact that he was _really _panicking. He rapped on the door to Sherlock's room – feeling oddly like he was imposing, despite the fact that Sherlock really couldn't give a shit about his personal boundaries – and taking a deep breath. It wouldn't be an issue if Mycroft hadn't gone awol and Sherlock hadn't been using again, but – "Sherlock?"

"_What_?" Sherlock demanded, door swinging open, face twisted into the sort of expression that bordered on frightening.

John stared at him for a few seconds before taking a step backwards. Obviously, Sherlock was not in a good mood today.

"Tea?" John suggested. He'd just had a cup – which Sherlock probably knew – but he didn't fancy admitting he was knocking on Sherlock's door to make sure that they hadn't fallen into a double dip relapse. He probably knew though. Stupid bastard.

"_What?"_

"I was wondering if you wanted tea."

"Don't lie," Sherlock spat, throwing open the door, "it's transparent and annoying."

"So you're...?"

"Busy." Sherlock said.

"Did you want tea then?"

"Inadequate." Sherlock muttered, falling into the sofa with his expression fixed in a straight line. The relief that Sherlock wasn't dead didn't quite succumb to the irritation that he was still an irksome git, but it lessened the blow slightly. That was probably one of the differences between Sherlock and a toddler – a more acute ability to walk, stronger tendency towards illicit substances and more sheer rudeness was involved.

"Ah, bad mood then," John said, pressing his finger to his temple, "excellent. I'll just assume everything I'm going to do today is wrong and move on, shall I?"

"What was the point of your little _google search _if you retain _nothing _of the little information those stupid websites make up?" Sherlock asked, pulling his knees up towards his chest, limbs all at tight angles, face twisted into displeasure.

"Withdrawal," John said, "right. You can talk to me, you know Sherlock."

"No," Sherlock said, "I can't, John, because whilst you are not utterly useless you've never had an _addiction _therefore you cannot possibly understand. So, _why don't we talk about something else, you say, _because, John, I can't _think _about anything else, can't concentrate on anything because if I don't..." Sherlock stopped sharply and tensed his shoulders slightly, "John, I need to borrow some money."

"Sherlock," John said, lips pursing, "I'm not funding your drug addiction."

"Cigarettes, John, _cigarettes_."

"You have money," John said, staring at him, "you were born _into _money. You don't care about money. You don't charge people for your work. Your cost costs more money than I've spent on all coats I've ever own since I was six."

"_Mycroft_," Sherlock muttered, "for some benign and ridiculous reason, mummy did not deem me _responsible _at eighteen to look after my own finances. Mycroft, I suspect, had something to do with _that_ decision, and _then _after university and rehab some _idiotic _doctor suggested that having access to large quantities of money would lessen the reality of the consequences of being a cocaine addict, thus leading to Mycroft setting up an entire office to vet the spending on my debit card."

"Sherlock, you never mentioned any of this."

"Yes, well," Sherlock said irritably, "after _you _he let up and stopped being so moronic, but a few text messages from yours truly – _oh, Sherlock's high again, please make his life more difficult _– and now I cannot buy _anything whatsoever."_

"Nothing?"

"Nothing," Sherlock muttered, irritably, "as ever, my brother is trying to make a point whilst missing the point entirely."

"Bills," John said, "Sherlock, we have bills. God, I'm going to have to get a job. More than a job, I need to win the sodding _lottery. _Sherlock, have you been cut off for a month? Did you not think to _mention _this to me?"

"Unimportant."

"Unimportant? Mrs Hudson? Our landlady who counts on the fact that we pay our rent to keep her in stock of tea and biscuits? Mrs Hudson is not unimportant."

"She's our House keeper," Sherlock corrected distractedly, "Bills are covered. Even Mycroft concedes that being homeless isn't beneficial to a cocaine addict. Anyway, John, if anything you owe me money."

"Really," John said, shaking his head slightly, "how does _that_ work out?"

"Oh, please, you think you've actually been paying half the rent? You might have refused to take Mycroft's money to spy on me, but _Mycroft gets what Mycroft wants. _I think he partially gets some _kick _out of the fact that Mrs Hudson doesn't notice he's paying twice the amount she asks for and that you are too unobservant to _notice _that your now about a thousand up to what you're _supposed _to be. He sent your sister a birthday present after I refused to purchase anything. I'm not even going to s_tart _on Lestrade's Christmas bonuses. It feeds his sense of superiority to hack into all your bank accounts."

"Or maybe," John said, "he's just looking after you?"

"Looking after me?" Sherlock hissed, "yes, he's awfully _caring."_

"Next time I see your brother, I'm going to bloody kill him." Sherlock glanced up at him. "Good god, Sherlock, he's bleeding ridiculous. All of that egotistical nonsense, _big brother is watching you – _literally – and continually acting as though you're about to _relapse_. At Christmas he was all too happy to insist I search through your sock draw and not take my eyes off you because you accepted a bloody _cigarette _which, really, isn't that much worse than nicotine patches. And now I inform him of a _cocaine problem _and his answer to support is to block your credit cards and disappear for a month with no word."

"No word to you, maybe," Sherlock said darkly, "and as touching as this tirade is, I'm really only here for the money."

"You know my pin."

"I'm not _pick pocketing _you, John."

John paused slightly feeling a little bit bemused. He'd actually assumed that Sherlock would have no qualms about simply _taking _his money like he did with everything else John owned – the laptop and the phone as top offenders – and had more or less started thinking of their finances as joint, anyway. They shared a flat and a sort of job, and it wasn't like Sherlock had ever voluntarily done the shopping himself. Their lives were most definitely too entangled to start working out who owed who what and John had taken that as a given; they might as well merge their bank accounts, for all the difference it would make. And if more expenses had been redirected onto John's card, Mycroft apparently made up the difference.

"The _what's mine is yours _rule that seems to exist within this flat stretches to cards," John said, nodding towards his wallet, "I thought that was a given."

Sherlock paused slightly. He looked awful and John was entirely sure that, whatever he'd been doing in his bedroom, it most definitely hadn't involved sleeping or any form of rest. Sherlock often looked like the walking dead, though, and particularly in the past few weeks when the effects of excessive cocaine usage was _obvious. _ His whole dreaded appearance had been topped off by an almost aggressively despondent frown and eyes narrowed to the point of ridiculous.

"We're not a couple, John." Sherlock said with an _almost _smile.

"Piss off," John grinned, "and get some bloody milk, would you?"

~0o0o0o0~

"John," Sherlock said, bursting into the flat with his eyes wide –although not in _that_ way – "we need to talk to Rachit Jain."

"Did you get the milk?" John asked, reaching for his coat on automatic whilst still debating whether or not it was advisable or possible to pull Sherlock off the case. Probably not. Even if it had taken however many cigarettes it had taken to get him to actually engage with the problem, it was better than a Sherlock hauled up in his room and actually relaying important information to him.

Sherlock didn't answer the question about the milk, so John took that as a 'of course not' and moved on.

"Did you actually get somewhere with the case whilst sulking in your room this morning then?" John pressed onwards, reaching for his phone in wake of a highly impatient Sherlock.

"I don't _sulk."_ Sherlock said, stopping in his track to stare at John.

"Yes, you do."

"I do not _sulk."_

"Nope," John said, "not playing the _do too _game with you."

"I was not _sulking."_

_"_What do you call it then?"

"I was _avoiding you."_ Sherlock said, his scarf still wrapped around his neck from his previous trip, now beginning to smell of smoke from the kick-started habit.

"Any particular reason why?" John asked. Sherlock gave him a look. One of those irritating looks which John was so used to now it might as well have been a spoken response. "It's not obvious to me."

"I..." he stopped abruptly and then glanced at the ceiling, "I didn't want to upset you again. And I was particularly irritable."

John's attempt at a comeback caught in his throat for a second, and he thought it must be one of those moments that had everyone convinced that they were shagging. Every time John thought that Sherlock was incapable of feeling or apologise or thinking of others, he was convinced otherwise. Course, the reverse was also true, so in the end it balanced out.

"So we're going to visit Rachit," John said, pocketing his phone and heading to the door to break the moment, "essentially, what Lestrade suggested we did yesterday?"

"Yesterday it wasn't important." Sherlock muttered, pushing ahead and skipping down the steps.

"Now you're just being stubborn."

"It's a matter of weighing up priorities. _Taxi!" S_herlock said, stepping forward and effortless hailing a cab as per – bloody talented arse.

"And Angelo's, sulking and procuring my credit car was a priority?" John asked, climbing in after him and noting that – once again – he'd missed the bit where Sherlock had actually given an address and would no doubt be the one who ended up paying. The taxi-bill was probably the highest of the lot.

"Cigarettes," Sherlock muttered, then he turned to face the window and John decided any further efforts at conversation were more or less pointless, but that gave him enough time to add to his mental 'signs of affection from Sherlock' list and block out extraneous thoughts about Harry.

* * *

_**Thank you to sevenpercent, deaka and marylouleach for reviewing! Thanks to you (presumptuous, but I'm going for it) for reading and a Merry Christmas to all (and a merry December 25th for those who don't celebrate actual Christmas).**_


	5. Chapter 5

Rachit Jain looked exhausted. John couldn't exactly blame the not-quite-man, because John wasn't entirely sure what he'd have done if his flatmate had died halfway through his second year at uni leaving him with a rent he couldn't afford by himself and the mournful aftertaste that always followed someone you cared about being murdered in the place you both called home.

"This is your girlfriend's flat?" Sherlock asked, glancing around the room with his scarf still fastened tight round his neck. John thought he looked a little better since his trip to buy cigarettes with John's card (he'd have liked to chalk it up to Sherlock appreciating the level of trust, but it was probably just the nicotine) but he still wasn't the same Sherlock that John was used to seeing on cases.

"Kiran," Rachit Jain said in his lightly accented voice, nodding. "I have been staying here since."

"You were good friends with Vince, then?" John ventured.

"Yes," Rachit said, glancing at the floor for a few minutes before turning his gaze to meet his again, "we were in the same block of flats in halls in first year. We were… good friends."

"Was he an easy man to live with?" Sherlock asked. John privately wondered what Sherlock classified as easy to live with – his attempts at being straight up with him when relaying the 'worst about each other' hadn't even been semi-close to the crap John willingly dealt with on a daily basis… but he certainly wouldn't have agreed if relapse and recreational drugs had been mentioned along with the incessant violin playing (which, really, he only disliked when Sherlock was decimating the instrument rather than playing – because when Sherlock _played _John wondered how the hell the man could ever claim to be bored). John, himself, had thought himself a difficult man to live with just on account of the PTSD and the nightmares. He'd never dream of claiming such a brash title as 'difficult flatmate' having lived with Sherlock.

"He was messier than I would have liked," Rachit said, smiling slightly, "but he was my friend and we liked living together. And he would always do the washing up eventually."

"The night he died?" Sherlock demanded, still pacing back and forwards across the space in Rachit's girlfriends kitchen.

"I was working on my group project with one of my course mate," Rachit said, "we emailed our report to our lecturer just before midnight and we were working on it until then."

"The memory stick?"

"He… Vince… he never took his memory stick out of his computer. He lost his A level coursework, I think, but I never saw his laptop without a memory stick in it. He was very careful about… backups."

"What if he had to print a piece of work at the library?" John suggested, glancing up at him.

"He had another memory stick for that purpose which he kept in his wallet. I checked _that_ memory stick and that was still there, but I looked everywhere for the other memory stick. I thought maybe it had just fallen out of the laptop but…"

"You don't know who Vince was planning to see that night?" Sherlock asked, stopping pacing for a few minutes to stare at the other man.

"I did not know he was going to be seeing anyone."

"And would he normally tell you if he was having visitors?"

"Most of the time," he said, "he did not have visitors very often. He would always warn me if it was near exam time, or if they were to be staying the night, or if there were to be multiple visitors."

"Did the police take the other memory stick?" Sherlock asked abruptly. Rachit nodded. "Fine," Sherlock said, glancing at his watch, "what day is the rubbish collected?"

"Tuesdays and Fridays." Rachit said slowly.

"John," Sherlock said, impatiently and was already heading towards the front door.

"Thank you for your time." John said, hurrying to pull back on his jacket and head out after Sherlock, offering awkward condolences before dashing out down the stairs and finding his flatmate, predictably, lighting up a cigarette and staring out into the road. "Sherlock," John muttered, "are we going to have to go over that conversation about manners _again_?"

"I sincerely hope not."

"Then it would be _just great _if you stopped deleting everything I said about treating people with _respect,_ Sherlock, because that _teenager _found his best mate dead in their kitchen. He's miles away from home and -"

"- hundreds of miles," Sherlock interjected, not looking at him and still staring out into the street, "he's an international student. And he's not a teenager, he's twenty."

" – yes, _well, _the point is, Sherlock, you were barely in there for ten minutes and that poor kid wants to help and you just disregarded the fact that…"

"Vincent Harper _wasn't _a heavy drinker." Sherlock said, stubbing out the cigarette under his foot. John swallowed back his nagging for another point, because apparently Sherlock was still making _mistakes_ which were not only _not good_ on the case front but also a definite negative reflection on the state of his mental health. Damn.

"But you said about the bottles?"

"Jumping to conclusions," Sherlock said, hands in his pockets and turning away from the flat they'd just existed and onto the road, "making conclusions without sufficient data."

"The recycling?"

"Yes, John, the recycling. There were not a sufficient number of bottles to suggest a sustained drinking habit throughout the week, meaning that our victim drank an uncharacteristic amount of alcohol on the day he was murdered."

John was trying not to think about Harry, but all this talk of empty bottles and alcohol wasn't really helping matters: he couldn't seem to get that bottle of beer Sherlock had thrown away out of his head, kept remembering that awful occasion when Harry had first met Sherlock and was trying not to be affected by it lest Sherlock noticed. Whilst, at the same time, very much wanting Sherlock to notice.

John shook his head slightly. He didn't need Sherlock to deduce all his emotional issues. Really, he didn't, because John had been coping with Harry for years.

"And what does that mean?"

"Why do people normally drink?" Sherlock asked, turning to face him with his electric case-eyes that John always thought were about to start _sparking _with thought. "Yesterday you, albeit briefly, ventured outside your normal drinking habits."

"Sherlock," John interjected, not sure if he was in the mood to rehash the almost argument they'd had the day previously.

"Stress, most likely, although obviously it was ineffective and an illogical solution given the fact that heavy drinking and relying on drinking to _navigate _yourself through a problem is an issue and cause of stress in itself from your perspective… but there are _other_ reasons. Dutch courage. Celebration. A distraction. Something to do."

"Which is it for you then, Sherlock?" John asked without really meaning to.

"I don't… _ah_." Sherlock said, finally turning to look at him with one of _those_ looks which made John feel like he was the worst person on the planet. John squared his shoulders against the decision and stared him down: he'd had a god awful few weeks and an even worse couple of days, his distraction in the form of a case turned out to have far too much alcohol related deduction in it for it to be working properly and Sherlock had refused to talk about the whole thing _properly _since John had taken him off cases.

"Because if you wanted something to do there's _a lot _of ironing."

"You _banned _me from using the iron."

"You can use it _to iron._"

"I was –"

"- to iron _clothes,_" John corrected, "Sherlock, I'm serious here. We need to talk about this."

"You're angry."

"I'm not _angry. _I'm not exactly over the bloody moon, but I'm not _angry_. I'm frustrated because I'm trying to help you blind as you're as tight lipped as ever – and I get that Sherlock, I do, but I _want _to help – and your _sodding _brother's just disappeared. On an occasion that could actually be useful he's just buggered off. And I'd like to talk about that, too, but you obviously don't want too and that's _fine _but I just…" John trailed off, "I'm worried about you." John could almost hear Sherlock repressing the _I'm fine _(which was good thing given John probably _would _be angry if Sherlock continued to lie to him about this stuff). "Now's not really the time, but we're going to talk about this later. So why was Vince drinking? Lost his precious memory stick? Flatmate bullying into talking about his emotions? Couldn't face the prospect of washing up?"

"No idea," Sherlock said, stepping forward and hailing a cab, "need more data."

John sighed and pressed his fingers to his forehead for a split second. He wasn't entirely sure what it was going to take to drag Sherlock into the conversation that they'd needed to have for weeks, but he imagined it was going to ardours and involve a lot of bribery and thinly veiled threats. And body parts in the fridge.

"After the case," John said, following Sherlock into yet another cap, "I'm serious about this."

"Please don't provide more reason to leave Lestrade to struggle through this _without_ my help."

"You've been complaining about being off cases for weeks." John muttered, rolling his eyes at the window and internally beginning to plan his _drugs are bad _speech all over again.

* * *

_Thanks to marylouleach, kellie, and TooLazyToLogIn for reviewing the last chapter! Sorry this one is a bit short compared to the others, but I figured I'd taken long enough :)_


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